Happiness as an expression of freedom and self-determination: a comparative multilevel analysis

"In this paper, subjecitve well-being, as measured by survey questions on life satisfaction and happiness, is investigated from a sociological-comparative point of view. The central thesis is that happiness will be greater the more freedom a person has in her/his life decisions. It is hypothesized,therefore, that happiness will be higher in all those social contexts (micro and macro) which provide a person with greater freedom. Hence, happiness should be higher among the employed, among the persons in higher positions and with higher incomes, and happiness should also be higher in free market and democratic, and in less stratified societies. A comparative emperical analysis (multilevel regression) is carried out, using survey data on 41 nations from the World Value Survey 1995-97. The finding that happiness is related significantly to the degree of individual freedom is fully confirmed. It also has been proven that people who live in circumstances providng providing more freedom of personal choice are happier; this happens only through their perception and trough their expected change (improvement or stagnation) in the future" (author's abstract

How social relations and structures can produce happiness and unhappiness: an international comparative analysis

"In this paper, subjective well being, as measured by survey questions on happiness and life satisfaction, is investigated from a sociological-comparative point of view. The central thesis is that happiness and satisfaction must be understood as the outcome of an interaction process between individual characteristics and aspirations on the one side, and social relations and macrosocial structures on the other side. A distinction is made between life satisfaction and happiness; the former is more seen as the outcome of an evaluation process including material and social aspirations and achievements, the latter as an outcome of positive experiences, particularly close personal relationships. The focus of this paper is on micro- and macrosocial conditions favouring or inhibiting the emergence of happiness and satisfaction. It is hypothesized that dense and good basic social relations, occupational involvement and success, sociocultural (religious and altruistic) orientations and participation are conducive to happiness and life satisfaction; the same should be true at the macrolevel for economic prosperity, relatively equal social structures, a well-established welfare state and political democracy. The latter conditions, however, should be more important for life satisfaction than for happiness. A comparative, multilevel regression analysis of happiness in 41 nations around the world is carried out (using the World Value Survey 1995–1997). Both our general assumption and most of the specific hypotheses could be confirmed. It turned very clearly that “happiness” and “life satisfaction” are two different concepts. It could be shown that microsocial embedding and sociocultural integration of a person are highly relevant for happiness. However, contrary to earlier studies, we find that macrosocial factors like the economic wealth of nation, the distribution of income, the extent of the welfare state and political freedom are also relevant, particularly for satisfaction. What counts most is the ability to cope with life, including subjective health and financial satisfaction, close social relations, and the economic perspectives for improvement in the future, both at the level of the individual and at that of the society. These abilities are certainly improved by favourable macrosocial conditions and institutions, such as a more equal income distribution, political democracy and a welfare state." (author's abstract

Social Desirability and the Willingness to Provide Social Media Accounts in Surveys. The Case of Environmental Attitudes

[EN] This paper contributes to the research on combining public opinion surveys and social media data by a) analyzing the effects of social desirability on the willingness to provide social media account information in surveys, and b) evaluating the congruence of opinions expressed in the survey and on social media. We analyze these questions by considering the willingness to make a sacrifice for the environment, i.e., the willingness to pay higher taxes and higher prices. Our results show that Facebook users who oppose environmental measures are less likely to share their account information in the survey, whereas this effect could not be found among Twitter users. Considering the congruence of opinions expressed in the survey and on Twitter, we find similar tendencies both at the aggregate and the individual level.Klösch, B.; Hadler, M.; Reiter-Haas, M.; Lex, E. (2022). Social Desirability and the Willingness to Provide Social Media Accounts in Surveys. The Case of Environmental Attitudes. En 4th International Conference on Advanced Research Methods and Analytics (CARMA 2022). Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 119-127. https://doi.org/10.4995/CARMA2022.2022.1506911912

An Overview of Attitudes and Opinions On the Role of Government: A Cross-national Comparison Covering the Period of 1985 to 2016

This contribution presents descriptive findings on individual attitudes and public opinion based on the International Social Survey Program Role of Government module. It covers the period from 1985 to 2016 and is guided by the idea that attitudes and opinions are aligned with the international divisions in different welfare regimes. The analysis includes all countries that fielded this ISSP survey continuously from 1985 (Australia, Germany, United Kingdom, and the United States) or 1990 (Hungary, Israel, and Norway). Our results show that attitudes and opinions remain rather stable over time and parallel the different welfare regimes. There is no clear evidence of a growing support for liberalization and deregulation across all countries despite the increasing market orientation in many countries

Modernisierungsverlierer und -gewinner: ihre Anteile, Wahrnehmungen und Einstellungen in einem 30 Staaten umfassenden Vergleich

'Der vorliegende Artikel beschäftigt sich in einem internationalen Vergleich mit Theorien, Thesen und Begriffen zum Thema Modernisierungsverlierer. Es wird eine Typologie entwickelt, in der objektive und subjektive Merkmale von Verlierern gemeinsam berücksichtigt werden. Diese Typologie umfasst vier Gruppen - die absoluten Gewinner und Verlierer sowie die vermeintlichen Gewinner und Verlierer. Die Analyse prüft u.a., ob und inwiefern Merkmale der Gewinner- und Verlierergruppen politische Einstellungen dieser Personengruppen (Einordnung im politischen Links-Rechts-Spektrum) beeinflussen. Darüber hinaus wird gezeigt, dass die Anteile von Modernisierungsverlierern und -gewinnern nicht nur Folgen ökonomischer Entwicklungen sind, sondern auch durch politische Maßnahmen (besonders staatliche Sozialausgaben) beeinflusst werden können.' (Autorenreferat)'In the context of an international comparison this article focuses on theories and concepts of 'modernization' losers. For this purpose a typology is introduced, considering both the objective and subjective aspects of being a loser. The typology proposes four groups: absolute winners and losers, and supposed winners and losers. Our analysis tests to which extent characteristics of the winner and loser groups impact political attitudes (for example, self-placement on a left-right axis). The distribution of modernization losers and winners is not only determined by economic developments, but may also be altered by political initiatives, such as public welfare expenditure.' (author's abstract)

Framing Analysis of Health-Related Narratives: Conspiracy versus Mainstream Media

Understanding how online media frame issues is crucial due to their impact on public opinion. Research on framing using natural language processing techniques mainly focuses on specific content features in messages and neglects their narrative elements. Also, the distinction between framing in different sources remains an understudied problem. We address those issues and investigate how the framing of health-related topics, such as COVID-19 and other diseases, differs between conspiracy and mainstream websites. We incorporate narrative information into the framing analysis by introducing a novel frame extraction approach based on semantic graphs. We find that health-related narratives in conspiracy media are predominantly framed in terms of beliefs, while mainstream media tend to present them in terms of science. We hope our work offers new ways for a more nuanced frame analysis

Wie demokratiefreundlich sind die EuropäerInnen? (Süd-)ost- und Westeuropa im Vergleich

'In diesem Beitrag wird der Zusammenhang zwischen den Einstellungen der europäischen Bevölkerung zur Demokratie und der politischen Geschichte, dem politischen System sowie dem sozioökonomischen Entwicklungsniveau der jeweiligen Länder untersucht. Für diesen Zweck wurden die Bewertungen von vier politischen Regierungsformen - der Demokratie, der Expertenregierung, der Regierung eines starken Führers sowie der Armeeregierung - herangezogen und analysiert. Datengrundlage ist der World Values Survey (WVS) der Jahre 1999 und 2000. Die Analyse ergibt einen deutlichen Zusammenhang zwischen den Einstellungen und den Ländercharakteristika. Im Besonderen zeigt sich, dass nicht oder weniger demokratische Haltungen in weniger entwickelten Regionen und Ländern häufiger vertreten sind. Demokratische Einstellungen variieren vor allem zwischen den Ländern und weniger innerhalb der Staaten - sie hängen eher von der Absenz eines autoritären Regimes in der jüngeren Vergangenheit als vom sozioökonomischen Entwicklungsniveau ab.' (Autorenreferat)'This article assesses the relationship of individual attitudes towards democracy and contextual characteristics such as the current political regime, its history and levels of socio-economic development. For this purpose the individual evaluations of a democratic rule, experts rule, army rule, and a strong-leader rule are considered. In methodical terms, the database of the World Values Survey, for the years 1999 and 2000, was used. The analysis reveals a strong relationship between individual political attitudes and different contextual factors. In particular, it can be demonstrated that undemocratic or less democratic views are more common in less developed regions and countries. Democratic values, on the other hand, vary primarily between countries and not so much within countries - they are more dependent on the absence of an authoritarian regime in the recent past than on the level of socio-economic development of the country. However, a certain level of prosperity represents a necessary underpinning.' (author's abstract)

The ISSP 2017 Survey on Social Networks and Social Resources: an Overview of Country-Level Results

This contribution complements the special issue on the 2017 ISSP survey on social networks and social resources by presenting a comprehensive overview of its results at the country level. Our analysis comprises a summary of the respondents' views on social trust and cohesion, the size and diversity their social network, their subjective health and life satisfaction, as well as the frequency of their contacts and their feeling of social isolation. When interpreting our results, we refer to the views of Putnam, Uslaner, and Larsen regarding the nature of social trust, its sources, and its consequences. In this regard, our findings show, for example, that country levels of social trust are line with prior findings - with Nordic societies such as Denmark, Iceland, Finland, and Sweden confirming their high-trust status. We, however, also observe an inverse relationship between objective inequality and the perception thereof in central-east European post-communist countries and China

Job Quality in the Economy for the Common Good : conceptualisation and implementation in Austria and Germany

The Economy for the Common Good (ECG) is an Austrian-born movement promoting an alternative economic model built on values oriented to the common welfare such as human dignity, solidarity, ecological sustainability, social justice, transparency and democratic participation. To provide (high) quality of work plays an important role in the ECG philosophy but little is known on the actual labour conditions of workers employed in such type of firms and whether they differ from those of firms in the ?regular? default economy. In this paper we focus on Austria and Germany, the countries where this economic model is most widespread, and present results on the general structure of firms following the ECG model and the working and employment conditions in these firms. We identify three main dimensions of job quality promoted by the ECG model, namely employment quality, information and worker participation, and psychosocial working conditions. Using data published in the Common Good Reports, we extracted data informing about these dimensions of job quality at an organisational level of 59 firms with at least 5 employees in Austria and Germany. We discuss which work-related features are promoted by organisations following the ECG model and compare them to the standards encouraged by the model. Results are also discussed with respect to evidence on the quality of work in the social economy